Flame on! Finally, fans get clear view of cauldron
(AP) — They finally freed the flame.
Vancouver organizers opened a rooftop promenade Wednesday to give visitors an unobstructed view of the Olympic cauldron, answering rising complaints that the icon of the games was inaccessible to the public.
The elevated deck is close enough to the flame that Olympic fans can actually feel the heat when the wind is right.
"This is really lovely," raved Carol Ensor, who lives in West Vancouver and was among the first to walk the promenade Wednesday morning. "It's much larger than I anticipated, and so much nicer seeing it from this level."
Organizers also moved a security fence about 65 feet closer, so flame-seekers can now get within about 100 feet of the cauldron. Workers cut a 6-inch-high opening along the barrier to accommodate ground-level photos.
The off-limits cauldron and unsightly chain-link fence have been among the biggest black eyes for an Olympics beset by glitches, from warm weather to timing errors at the biathlon.
For the first five days of the games, it was nearly impossible to get an unobstructed, up-close picture of the flame. International media went so far as to compare it to the Iron Curtain.
The cauldron became such a burning issue that The Globe and Mail newspaper in Toronto implored John Furlong, head of the Vancouver organizing committee: "Mr. Furlong, tear down this fence!"
Furlong told reporters Wednesday that the change was made as quickly as possible once the distant cauldron became a matter of "broad public discussion."
"We actually believe we have a solution that's better than the one people were originally asking for," he said.
The promenade is along the roof of a building next to the flame that will become a restaurant after the games. Visitors walk up a long ramp to get there, about a 10-minute wait. Hundreds were already lining up in the hours after the observation deck opened.
"I think it's awesome," said Katie Mullen, visiting from Leamington, Ontario. "I wasn't really as disappointed with how far back it was more as I was that the fence was kind of ugly."
"Just look at it," she went on. "You're here. It's so surreal that you're even standing in front of it."
The cauldron sits along Vancouver's picturesque waterfront. It's about 30 feet high and resembles a shimmering steel teepee, four slanted legs leaning against a higher central tower. All five pieces have individual flames.
It's a replica of a cauldron lit indoors during the opening ceremony Friday night. The indoor flame was glitchy, too — one of the four legs malfunctioned and failed to rise from the floor.
